The Bitcoin network marks its first ten years today. The date of the celebration is met by the registration of the first block, known as block genesis, recorded in the blockchain of Bitcoin by the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto.
Although it is not yet known who Nakamoto is or if it is about several people, the details of the first block recorded in the Bitcoin blockchain are public. Block 0, registered on 2009-01-03 at 18:15:05, has a single transaction recorded, with a difficulty of 1, and generated a reward of 50 bitcoins (BTC). These were the first BTC generated in the entire history of the ecosystem.
Thanks Satoshi. We owe you one. Happy 10th birthday, Bitcoin.
In addition to the first bitcoins, the genesis block also includes arbitrary content recorded during the generation of the first-born block of the network. Inserted in the input field called coin base, block 0 has a message written in the hexadecimal code corresponding to a headline in the British newspaper The Times: “Chancellor on the verge of a second rescue for banks”.
The hexadecimal code -16 characters from 0 to F- of the genesis block went unnoticed at the time of insertion because it was set like this:
“Coinbase 04ffff001d0104455468652054696d65732030332f4a616e2f32303039204368616e63656c
6c6f72206f6e206272696e6b206f66207365636f6e64206261696c6f757420666f722062616e6b73 “
Hexadecimal code, Genesis block, Bitcoin.
The translation of the hexadecimal code was quickly known among the connoisseurs of the code. So far, the meaning of the message included in the genesis block has different interpretations. Some say it is a political message, while others say it is proof that the genesis block was not a pre-empted one.
However, there is no official version. Today, ten years later, Bitcoin developer Peter Todd made reference to it on his Twitter, as BitMEX brokerage published an advertisement on the cover of the same London newspaper, The Times, saying, “Thank you Satoshi. We owe you one. Happy 10th birthday, Bitcoin. “
In addition, the announcement at the foot of the front page of the newspaper The Times includes the hash of block 554.509 of Bitcoin, undermined by BTC.com, whose entry in coinbase can be read as “Thank you Satoshi.”
This year the crypto community decided to celebrate the tenth anniversary of Bitcoin with an invitation to the withdrawal of all the BTC from exchange houses, seeking to implant a new tradition in the community. The initiative, called by the bitcoin Trace Mayer, aims to perform a “key test” by asking bitcoins users to transfer all their funds to their portfolios with private keys under personal care as a declaration of monetary sovereignty.
Many participants of the crypto-economy have joined the initiative that plans to develop throughout today. However, this is not the only initiative that takes place this Thursday. The developer, JRatCliff published an infographic which explains byte to byte what contains a block of the bitcoin network on the occasion of the celebration of 10 years. This information was also stored in one of the blocks of the network.
Both initiatives are proof of the growth that has occurred not only in technology, which went from being used as a payment method for pizzas to places on the darknet. The construction of second-layer technologies such as the Lightning Network, a decade after the execution of the idea of Satoshi Nakamoto, continues working in favour of the principles of decentralization of finances, which facilitate that each person can become and have their own bank.
